Tuesday, September 19, 2017

Hey all, Robin here, I take over Michael's blog from time to time. I'm the one who organizes the shipping of his "stuff." I'm also in charge of the alpha reading, beta reading, Kickstarters, and coordination with the copy editors. I'm usually always busy, but I don't think I've ever been quite this pressed. The deadlines for Age of War and The Disappearance of Winter's Daughter has made me do back-to-back beta reads. One of the book is with the copy editors right now, and as soon as it comes back, I need to send the other one out -- which I'm currently compiling beta read feedback for Michael's incorporation.

All that preamble is to say that I've not yet sent out the signed bookplates and bookmarks that were part of the Age of Swords pre-order campaign. I want to do them all at once as doing them "piecemeal" is so much more time consuming. My plan is to have the beta feedback to Michael in the next few days and that opens up a window for me to to do the shipping of the bookplates and bookmarks (which he's already signed). So, if you ordered them. Please bare with me for just a few more days. They'll be in the post soon!

Saturday, September 9, 2017

A while ago I mentioned that there was a formatting problem with Age of Swords. Apparently my book wasn't the only one affected and it was due to a change in the program that Amazon used to change a .epub file into a .mobi. The good news is the vast majority of readers were NOT hitting the bug. I know from my own testing that my Kindle was fine, as was reading the book from the cloud, the only place I saw the extra line breaks was on my iPad when using an older version of the Kindle App.

For those that were seeing the extra line breaks, it may have automatically fixed itself, but if your ebook is still showing a problem, here is a set of steps to get it fixed.

First: Set your account to automatic updates and then new content should be pushed automatically. This is a setting on your Amazon Account page, not on the device itself. Go to your Amazon account, under Manage your content and devices, there is a settings tab. A little less than halfway down the page, there is a setting for Automatic Book Update. Make sure it is on. Wait a few minutes and the file should automatically update.

If that doesn’t work...
Sync the device, then check to see if the book updates within a couple minutes. You should see it look like it's re-downloading.

If that doesn’t work...
Delete the book from the device, then sync the device, then check to see if the book updates within a couple minutes. You should see it look like it's re-downloading.

If that doesn’t work...
Reach out to Amazon customer support (be sure you are within Amazon technical customer support) and explain to them that you know there is an updated version of this file and you have tried to download it, but it is not loading. They will need to push the new file to your device manually.

That should take care of things. I know for me, (on an ipad using the Kindle app) I also had to update to the lastest version of the app. Please let me know if none of those work for you, and I'll put you in touch with the digital team at my publisher.

Wednesday, September 6, 2017

So, with Age of Swords now released, I've been getting a lot of emails asking about the next Riyria book: The Disappearance of Winter's Daughter. Hopefully I'll be able to answer a lot of the questions here.

First off, one of the reasons I've been a bit quiet on this project is I had a publisher interested in the print and ebook rights and I wanted if I were to sign with them, the book would take one path, and if I self-published it'd go another another route. Well, we finally got that all figured out and the two of us couldn't come to a meeting of the minds (meaning they wanted rights I didn't want to give up). I'm a bit disappointed, but I do think it'll work out best in the long run. The Death of Dulgath has had a fabulous run and we'll be using the same model for The Disappearance of Winter's Daughter (for the most part).

Okay, so let's get into some of the nitty gritty about his release.

Release date: December 5th, 2017 - Just 3 months from now!

Alpha reading & Beta reading pretty much took up all of July and August. I've incorporated all the changes from both groups, which has made significant improvement and both I and Robin are really pleased with how the final story wrapped up.

As of September 4th, the book is in the hands of the copy editors (Linda Branam and Laura Jorstad). I've worked with both of these amazing women in the past on multiple projects (Hollow World, Death of Dulgath, Age of Myth, Age of Swords) and they have assured me they can work their magic by early October.

That'll give us 2 weeks to approve/reject the copy edits and do a final reading of the entire book. Tight, but should be doable.

Recording of the audio book and production of the ebook and print editions will start mid-October. Tim Gerard Reynolds will, of course, be doing the narration. And Robin and I will be going to New York/New Jersey for the recording. The hope is to get the book on the presses by end of October.

Yes, we will be doing a Kickstarter for this, the plan is for it to launch October 1 and it'll probably run for 3 weeks. At that time the book will already be done...so what is the Kickstarter for? Well, it's for hardcover editions: Rare, Limited Edition, Regular Hardcover, and Tradepaper paperbacks. If for some reason the Kickstarter doesn't fund, the book still comes out, there just won't be hardcover editions. I'm fairly confident that it'll fund though.

A Kickstarter also allows us to do some bonus stuff like signed books, bookmarks, and what not. And, under special arrangement with Audible we'll be able to include an audio option for the Kickstarter!! Which is really exciting.

Also, people who participate in the Kickstarter can get the book 6 months before it's for sale through the retail markets. So that's going to be a real plus. The plan is for Kickstarter (or people who buy direct from our site) will get the book on December 5th and the book will be in B&N and Amazon come June 5th.

One thing we'll be doing, with this Kickstarter, however, is significantly reducing the "bonus add on" stuff. Robin got really excited last time and she kept adding all kinds of things: coffee mugs, bags, t-shirts, etc. The intention was a good one, but the reality is the shipping became a nightmare. We had hundreds of T-shirt skus when you took into consideration Men's and Women's, multiple colors and various sizes.

We also will have "early bird specials" which means you can get some of the most popular pledge levels at a discounted price. You'll have to be quick, though. Last time the early birds ran out just a few hours of the launch of the Kickstarter. If you want to be notified when the Kickstarter goes live, here is a link to sign-up.

Well, I think that about covers things for now. We'll keep you posted as we get closer. I hope you're as excited about this as we are.

Tuesday, August 29, 2017

Audible has just released it's fall preview where it highlights their most anticipated releases that are coming soon. I'm proud that The Disappearnce of Winter's Daughteris one of their featured selections. Here's the full list.

Wednesday, August 23, 2017

I'm a huge fan of goodreads. Not only do I love the site as a reader...but it has also been hugely instrumental in my writing career. In fact, I'd say that apart from my books, themselves, goodreads is the single biggest reason I've been able to make a full-time living from my favorite pastime.

But goodreads is intimidating to many authors, and it's easy to see why. It's massive and complex, and it's a site that if you approach in the wrong way can hurt your reputation with readers rather than help it.

Having been at the site since October 2008, I've learned a few things, and seen a lot of changes. I'm also fortunate to have a wife that knows goodreads inside and out, and has helped me build a brand on the site that goes far beyond my writing credentials. In other words, I have a much larger footprint on goodreads than my book sales reflect. In short, I'm a solid mid-list author, but on Goodreads I'm ranked #39 in the US and #45 globally. That puts me side-by-side with the likes of Stephen King, James Patterson, and Margaret Atwood.

How is this possible? Well, it's because of what I've learned and howI approach the site. And Robin and I are going to be sharing our secrets in a on-line workshop for Writer's Digest University.Here are the specifics:

When: Thursday August 24th at 1:00 PM EST
Where: Writer's Digest University
How: It's an online seminar, which will be recored such that if you aren't available on Thursday at 1:00 you can watch it at your own leisure and re-watch it for the next year
Cost: Yes, there is a fee, but it's quite reasonable $79.99 for a 90 minute seminar so less than a dollar a minute.

So, if you're a writer and want to learn more about how to use goodreads to help find and audience join Robin and I. Not only will we be presenting, but there will be plenty of time for Q & A. Hope to see you there.